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ACID
RAIN-FIGHTING ENVIRONMENTAL ORGANIZATION URGES
SUPPORT FOR PROPOSED INTERSTATE AIR QUALITY RULE
If Approved, the Regs Would Stop Acid Rain Damage
in Adirondacks & Improve Human Health Nationwide
For more information:
John F. Sheehan
518-432-1770 (ofc)
518-441-1340 (cell)
518-489-4186 (home)
Released, Wednesday, February 25, 2004
CHICAGO - The
Adirondack Council today praised the US Environmental Protection
Agency's proposed Interstate Air Quality Rule, telling federal
officials hosting a hearing on the rule that the cuts it requires
would stop acid rain damage in the Adirondack Park and help Chicago
residents breathe more easily.
At six million acres (more than 9,000 square miles), New York's
Adirondack Park is the largest American park outside of Alaska.
It was the first place in America to show signs of acid rain
damage, beginning in the 1970s. The Adirondack Council, the park's
largest environmental organization, has been fighting for a solution
ever since.
If approved, the new rule for electric power plants in 29 eastern
states would reduce sulfur dioxide emissions by 50% from 2002
levels by 2010; and by 71% by 2015. Nitrogen emissions from power
plants in the region will also be reduced in two phases, to levels
65% below current emissions by 2015.
Bernard C. Melewski, Counsel to the Adirondack Council, told
the US Environmental Protection Agency hearing panel today that
the organization was pleased with the deep cuts proposed in the
new rule. He urged Chicago residents and others in attendance
to support the proposed rule. The hearing was held at the Chicago
Hilton. The hearing will continue on Thursday, February 26.
"It is most fitting that we testify today in Chicago,"
Melewski said. "The same coal-fired power plants that provide
cheap electricity to this state, and to Wisconsin, Minnesota,
and communities along the length of the Ohio River Valley, also
produce the sulfur and nitrogen pollutants which create rainfall
with the acidity of tomato juice that falls in pristine Adirondack
valleys, and vinegar-like acidic fog that bathes our mountaintops.
"Your communities are not spared from the damage of these
emissions. Your historic buildings and limestone monuments, like
ours, are literally melting from the chemical onslaught. Lethal
mercury falls from Lake Michigan to Long Island Sound. And the
people suffer- from ozone in the summer and from microscopic
particulates that make it difficult to breathe year-round. Our
problem is your problem," Melewski explained.
"The Adirondack Council welcomes and strongly supports the
proposed Air Quality Transport Rule Interstate Air Quality Rule.
. The rule is intended to address the inability of downwind states,
such as New York, to come into compliance with national ambient
air quality standards, when power plant emissions from outside
their borders are a substantial contributor to their pollution
problems," Melewski said.
"The Interstate Air Quality Rule will result in substantial
public health benefits, far in excess of its cost. Tens of thousands
of premature deaths of our citizens with respiratory illnesses
may be avoided each year. We applaud these steps on behalf of
all New Yorkers. But we take a special interest in the secondary
benefits of the reduction in acid deposition throughout the eastern
portion of the nation and in the most sensitive area, the Adirondack
Park," Melewski said.
He testified that there is still room for improvement of the
proposed rule, either by shortening the timelines, or by deepening
the proposed emissions cuts. He said the Council would ask EPA
to do both.
The new cap and trade program envisioned in the proposed rule
and the target reductions in emissions meet or exceed the recommendations
in the Report to Congress by the National Acid Deposition Assessment
Program in 1998, and is consistent with the recommendations of
several other similar reports.
In January, the National Research Council of the National Academy
of Sciences recommended that EPA address the regional transport
of pollutants with a multi-pollutant approach for similar sources.
The NRC recommended a cap and trade strategy where feasible.
In December of 2002, Environmental Defense issued a publication
alling on the EPA to adopt a new cap and trade program year round
for nitrogen with additional cuts in sulfur that would focus
on the eastern region. The EPA's proposed rule parallels that
report.
The rule echoes the recommendations of the Southern Appalachian
Mountains Initiative (SAMI), a collaborative effort to improve
air quality which involved a number of state agencies, environmental
organizations, and the scientific community. The SAMI report
was issued in August of 2003.2002. The proposed rule also meets
the goals of the acid rain platform adopted by the Association
of New England Governors' and Eastern Canadian Premiers at their
annual conference in 1999.
"Congress has been deadlocked on clean air issues for so
long, it is a welcome change to see the decisive action to bring
our acid rain problems to an end," Melewski later explained.
"The sooner we start making these cuts, the sooner our lakes
and forests will recover from decades of damage."
As a result of decades of acid rain, more than 500 of the Adirondack
Park's 2,800 lakes and ponds are too acidic to support their
native life. Thousands of acres of high-elevation red spruce
and fir forests have been wiped out and acid-rain-caused mercury
contamination has been documented in more than 20 Adirondack
lakes, making the fish unfit to eat.
Founded in 1975, the Adirondack Council is a privately funded
not-for-profit organization dedicated to ensuring the ecological
integrity and wild character of the Adirondack Park. The Council
accomplishes its goals through research, education, advocacy
and legal action. The Council does not accept government support
of any kind.
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